The sudden access to wealth from natural resources is known to cause a number of challenges to the host country. It can be destabilised by an abrupt, volatile and finite source of revenue and/or be misled to act unsustainably with… Read more

In 2007, Finland’s government decided to adopt a new approach to dealing with homelessness. Setting themselves the ambitious aim of halving long-term homelessness by 2011 and eradicating it by 2015, a working group developed and implemented an integrated strategy based… Read more

In the global war on drugs, a new strategy is needed to eradicate drug-related violence and eliminate the black market. US foreign policy and international treaties, such as the UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs in 1961, have been highly… Read more

The United Kingdom’s 2010-2015 coalition government announced Universal Credit (UC) in 2010. The initiative was introduced in the Welfare Reform Act 2012 as a means of bringing together six benefits, including housing benefit, working tax credits and jobseeker’s allowance, within one scheme. However,… Read more

In most Western countries, the number of people aged over 65 is set to double in the next couple of decades. At the same time, especially in Germany, access to childcare is becoming more and more difficult and expensive, while… Read more

People in Japan are living longer at the same time as birth rates are falling. As fewer people are active in the labour market and more people require assistance and care, the trend presents major issues for the country’s economic… Read more

In 1995, Singapore’s public service under the management of Lim Siong Guan wanted to be ready for the challenges they were facing in the future and re-structured their working culture into a more entrepreneurial style that would be able to… Read more

Dependent on oil for too long, Abu Dhabi has invested US$15 billion in building Masdar City, a sustainable, low carbon eco-city in the desert. Masdar city is an ongoing project of the Abu Dhabi government to learn how to build… Read more

In 1975, Sweden’s National Preschool Act vastly expanded the public childcare system by providing a minimum of 525 hours of free preschooling. The Act was the culmination of economic initiatives aimed at meeting the needs of working mothers in a time of… Read more

Before 2007, citizens of the Philippines had to complete 11 individual governmental procedures and wait for at least 48 days before they were allowed to conduct official commercial activities. As well as causing long delays, this sort of governmental red tape… Read more